The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune

The Bahamas government is in no position to carry out the unreasonable demands of HBO Latin America, even in the face of the threat of having the Trump administration withdrawing its trade preferences. HBO is owned by Warner Media Entertainment, a subsidiary of AT&T. Warner Media Entertainment’s revenue for 2018 was $33 billion. To get an idea of how massive this media conglomerate is in terms of high finances, the Bahamian government’s revenue for 2012 --three years prior to the introduction of VAT, was just $1.5 billion.

With thousands of Bahamian households utilising Android TV Boxes, Fire TV Sticks and other streaming devices, traditional cable and satellite services are fast becoming obsolete. In the US, approximately 6.5 percent of American households access illegal television streaming services each month, which represents a revenue loss of $4.2 billion annually to traditional cable TV and satellite providers, while illegal streaming operators are generating upwards of $840 million on an annual basis. The US government, with its first world technology, cannot effectively police its 329 million citizens in regards to which streaming services they access, so how does HBO Latin America expect a government of a third world country to do it? HBO Latin America needs to get with the times. Even legitimate streaming services are hurting traditional cable TV and satellite providers.

This is the age of Netflix, Hulu, Quibi, Amazon Prime Video, Amazon Prime Music, CBS All Access, Crackle, Plex, Sling, YouTube Red, Crunchyroll, PlayStation Vue, ESPN+, DC Universe, R.I.P Seeso, VRV, Boomerang, Apple TV, Spotify, Apple Music and Disney plus. These legal streaming services costs between $5 and $15 per month – much cheaper than traditional cable TV. Rather than make unreasonable demands, HBO Latin America needs to lower its astronomical fees in order to compete with the foregoing streaming service providers. As for petitioning President Donald Trump to punish The Bahamas and this region; after being impeached by the Democratic controlled House of Representatives, I would suspect that Trump currently has far more pressing matters to attend to.

KEVIN EVANS

Freeport,

Grand Bahama.

December 22, 2019.